The materialist way of thinking, notwithstanding its mechanistic limits, still has an undoubted appeal for many contemporary philosophers. Against their claims, I think that a reading of the arguments framed by Leibniz and Berkeley is instructive for those who do not share the materialist standpoint. Naturally, Leibniz and Berkeley disagree on many issues, and the general position of the one is very different from that of the other; but both attack the very heart of materialism with similar arguments, refuting the same elements in a similar way.¹